Flat-knitting machine



C. F. KAU FMANN Oct. 16, 1928.

Filed Feb. 1927 3 Sheets-Sheet l Oct. 16, 1928.

C F KAUFMANN FLAT KNITTING MACHINE Filed Feb. 5, 1927 3 Sheets-Sheet 2 Oct. 16, 1928. 1,687,866

c. F. KAUFMANN FLAT KNITTING MACHINE Filed Feb. 5, 192 7 3 Sheets-Sheet 3 Patented Get. 16, I28.

STATES PATENT OFFICE.

CHRISTIAN FRIEDRICH KAUFMANN, OF HEINRICHSORT, NEAR LICHTENSTEIN -CALL1\T- BERG, GERMANY,.ASSIGNOR '10 DAVID RICHTER A. G., MASCHINENFABRIK, TI ILL- WEIBEEEI, F GHEIVINITZ, GERMANY.

FLAT-KNITTING MiAcnmn.

Application filed February 3, 1927, Serial No. 165,677, and in Germany May 14, 1926- This invention relates to flat knitting machines and has for its object to provide a machine of this kind, with which plated fabrics may be made with patterns of all kinds.

In the art of knitting great value has been placed for a long time on the perfecting of colour patterns in stockings and socks. For this purpose threads of different colour were used in the knitting machines, a ground thread and a pattern thread. This produced the so-called .Schottenmuster (tartan, diced patterns and the like) which however have the drawback, that the fabric is thickened at various places and the stocking consequently loses its elasticity, in addition to which open threads could not be avoided on the back of the fabric. V7 hen such stockings or socks were in use the threads were liable to tear, the stitches to unravel and the stockings to become useless. In all the methods used hitherto the possible number of patterns was limited. This was most evident in the so-called reversing plating machines with which, while they did away with the drawback of the open threads, as they reversed the ground thread and the plating thread in the machine, it was only possible to make fabric with longitudinal stripes. The colour effect or pattern was in this case produced by speciallyshaped working sinkers, which cannot be put out of'operation at will. Another disadvantage was that the loops were formed in a difierent manner at the placeswhere these sinkers were in operation, so that a stripy fabric resulted.

With the present invention it is possible on a flat knitting machine to work any kind of pattern into plated fabrics, such as stockingsand socks, for instance flowers, tendrils, squares on the cross and the like. This is eflected according to the invention by the ground thread and the plating thread being displaced with respect to one another during the forming of the loop by rods operated by a pattern mechanism, for instancejacquard cards, such that in the loops corresponding to the pattern the plating thread lies under the ground thread of a different colour. In spite of this change over the fabric retains its elasticity and no loose threads appear on the back of the farbic.

The accompanying drawings illustrate the present invention by way of example,

' Figure 1 showing as much of a flat knitting machine as is required to illustrate the invention,

Figure 2 shows in side elevation and plan view the shape of the small bars which act on the loop,

Figure 3 shows to an enlarged scale how ithe small bars act on the threads of a needle Figure 4 shows the position of the threads in the. loop after the small bars have acted on them,

Figure 5 shows the normal position of the threads of a needle loop, which have not been acted on by the small bars,

Figures 6 and 6 show the action of the small bars on a sinker loop,

Figure 7 shows in elevation and to a greatly enlarged scale the position of the small bars with respect to the sinkers, when acting on the sinker loop,

Figure 8 shows to the same scale the position of the small-bars withrespect to the sinkers and needles, when engaging in the needle loop,

Figure 9 shows to an enlarged scale a piece of the finished fabric in plan view,

Figure 10 shows, also to a greatly enlarged scale, several loops of an ordinary plated fabric,

Figure 11 shows to the same scale as Fi ure 10 several loops of the fabric made. according to the present invention, in which the small rods have acted on the needle loops,.

and v Figure 12 shows to the same scale the effect of the small bars on the sinker loop in the finished fabric. I

As will be seen from Figure 1, there is fixed to the ordinary bed of a flat knitting machine. an arm 10 supporting a guidin member 1 and the guiding bars 3, 4, 5 in whic i the small bars 2 are capable of sliding. In the constructional example shown the bars 2 are olfset and are bent slightly outwards at their forward end, as will be seen in the plan View in Figure 2. Against the offset portion of the bars 2, which are arranged in pairs as shown in Figs. 7 and 8, there rests a pressure bar 6 which is capable of sliding on the guide bar 3 and is guided on its upper side by the widened head of a stepped screw 7 A spring QhaVing one of its ends (not shown) fixed to the machine frame is attached to the hook 8 of the pressure bar 6 and draws the latter in the direction of the arrow against the pair of bars 2, so that the bars 2 have their rear ends pressed against jacquard cards 19 resting on a cylinder 20 which, as in the well known jacquard mechanism is moved back by means not shown in the drawing into the position shown in broken lines, where it performs a sixth of a revolution, after which it returns into the position shown in full lines.

The jack sinkers 12 of a known type are mounted in the press 13 and in the sinker cover 14, which latter rests on the member 15. The press 13 i sscrewed onto the head piece 16. The movable discharging piece 17 lies below the sinker-s in" a known manner, between which the needles 18 of a known shape move in a known manner. The guiding bars 3, 4, 5 have slots milled into them to correspond to the pitch of the needles. In each slot are two small bars 2, it being assumed in the,first instance that these pairs of bars act on the needle loops as shown in Figure 8, i. e., when moving forwards, move on either side of a needle 18.

The mechanism operates as follows: In plating, as is Well-known, the ground thread I) (Fig. 10) lies at the bottom, while the plating thread a, which comes slightly later, hes above the same, (Fig. 5). llf forinstance,

the thread I) is black and the thread a white,-

the underside of the fabric will appear black and the upper side white. On a. pair of small bars being pushed forward during the forward motion of the cylinder 20 by the jacquard card which is not perforated at this point, the small bars, owing to their inclined forward ends (Fig. 3) will slightly spread the ground thread, whlle the thread a, owing to the shape of the small bars 2 retains its original shape. The needles 18 will then descend and in the loops engaged by the small bars 2 draw the thread a through the longer thread I) as shown in Figure 4. Consequently in this needle loop the black ground thread I) will have come to the top, while the white plating thread a will appear on the lower side, i. e., at the black ground, as shown in Figure 11, to a considerably enlarged scale. In this figure it is assumed that in three of the six loops shown the small bars 2 have acted, by which in the three needle loops the position of the ground thread I; and the plat-. ing thread a has been reversed in such a manner that the black ground thread appears in the loop.

Figure 5 shows the loop which forms at the needles on which the bars 2 have not acted,

the ends of which, on the forward movement of the cylinder 20, have entered in a hole in the jacquard card under the action of the spring loaded pressure bar 6.

So far the reversal of the needle loop has been described with reference to Figs. 1 to 5,

8 and 11, but the sinker loops may be reversed in the same way, as will be seen from Figures 6, 6 ,7 and 12. The pairs of small bars 2 are in this case displaced laterally by half the pitch, so that they can move laterally past the sinkers 12, as'shown in Figure 7. They must also be slightly lowered, as shown in Fig. 6, so that, when moving forward, they force to the left and right of each sinker 12 the ground thread 7) backwards into the throat of the sinker, the thread a at the same time slipping slightly forwards. This causes, as shown 1n Figure 6, the thread b to lie behind the thread a in the sinker loop, resulting in the finished fabric in the pattern shown to a greatly enlarged scale in Figure 12. In this case two sinker loops 0 have been reversed by the action of the small bars 2, such that in these loops the black ground thread 6 lies on the.

topl

Thus, at each loop acted on by a pair of small bars 2 both in the case of a needle and of a sinker loop a spot of difierent colour is formed on the right side of the loop. These spots may be combined to form any figures by using a pattern mechanism, such for in stance as the jacquard here described By changing the colours an infinite variety of patterns may be made and, as the present invention makes this possible, even single loops may be made alone in a difl'erent colour, so that the invention provides the possibility of producing patterns which cannot be made even by colour printing.

The pairs of small bars may be replaced by single bars having their forward ends slotted in the shape of a fork and otherwise formed in the same way as the forward ends of the pairs of small bars shown.

What I claim is: v

1. A flat knittin machine for the manufacture of plated fa pattern, comprising a machine bed a plurality of needles, a plurality of sin ers ca- -pable of coacting with the needles, an arm fixed to the machine bed, guides on the said bed, small bars in pairs shdable in the said guides, an oflset on the small bars, a c linder, jacquard cards capable of traveling round the'cylinders, spring loaded ressure bars for engaging with the said 0 sets on the small bars and pressing them against the jacquard cards on the cylinder, means for approaching the cylinder towards the small bars, whereby, on the cylinder moving forward, a plurality of pairs of small bars are displace according to the perforations in the jacquard card, forwardly towards the needles, of the knitting machine, displacing the ground thread in such' a manner that, after the formation of the loop, it lies on the right side of the fabric, as set forth.

2. A flat knitting machine as claimed in brics with any desired claim 1, and in which the pairs of small bars pable of moving forward on the sinkers and consequently acting on the sinker loops, when being formed, as set forth.

3. A flat knittin machine for the manufacture of plated abrics with any desired pattern knitted with a ground thread and a plating thread, comprising a plurality of needles, sinkers capable of coacting with said needles for forming the loops and a pattern mechanism in combination with small bars arranged opposite said sinkers, said bars being capable of moving towards said sinkers and said needles under the control of said pattern mechanism and of displacing one of said threads relatively to the other, so'

as to enable the needles to reverse the positions of the ground thread and plating thread in the loop, as and for the purposes set forth.

4. A flat knitting machine for the manufacture of plated fabrics with any desired pattern knitted with a ground thread and a plating thread, comprising a plurality of needles, sinkers capable of coacting with said needles for formin the loops and a jacquard mechanism in com ination with small ba'rs arranged opposite said sinkers and adapted to be operated directly by said mechanism, said bars being capable of movingtowards said sinkers and said needles under the control of the jacquard mechanism and of displacing one of said threads relatively to the other, so as to enable the needles to reverse the positions of the ground thread and plating thread in the loop, as and for the purposes set forth.

In testimony whereof I have signed my name to this specification.

CHRISTIAN FRIEDRICH KAUFMAN". 

